Metallus Inc has named Kristopher Westbrooks as its next president and chief executive officer, with the appointment taking effect on 1 January 2027. The Canton, Ohio manufacturer said on 31 August 2026 that its board had selected Westbrooks, currently president and chief operating officer, and that he will also join the board of directors on that date. The four month gap between the announcement and the start date frames the move as a planned succession rather than an immediate change at the top.
The handover is phased. Michael Williams retires as chief executive officer and as a director with effect from 31 December 2026, and will then serve as special adviser to the chief executive and to the board until 30 June 2027, keeping him available to the company through the first six months of his successor's tenure. Ronald Rice is chairman of the board that made the appointment. Westbrooks takes the president title alongside the chief executive role, as Williams holds it now.
Westbrooks has spent eight years at Metallus. He joined the company in September 2018 as executive vice president and chief financial officer and was promoted to president and chief operating officer in June 2025. Before joining Metallus he was vice president, chief accounting officer and corporate controller at A. Schulman, and earlier in his career he held roles at Procter and Gamble. He began his working life in public accounting at PwC. His experience across those roles is in accounting, financial reporting and, since June 2025, operations.
Metallus is based in Canton, Ohio, and its shares trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker MTUS. The company employs about 1,905 people and reported sales of 1.2 billion dollars in 2025. The board Westbrooks will join on 1 January 2027 is the one that selected him.
The appointment is an internal promotion, and the sequence suggests a prepared succession rather than an opportunistic one: Westbrooks was moved into the chief operating officer role in June 2025 and was named as the next chief executive 14 months later, which points to the 2025 promotion having been a step in a plan rather than a standalone move. His experience is weighted towards finance and accounting, so the board has chosen a financial operator to run the company. On the company's own figures, sales of 1.2 billion dollars and a workforce of about 1,905, the business he inherits generates roughly 630,000 dollars of revenue for each employee. The decision to keep Williams on as an adviser for six months after his retirement date, rather than ending the relationship at the handover, suggests the board is weighting continuity over a clean break. The timetable also gives the company a settled leadership calendar into the middle of next year.
